The First Virtual Model of Ancient Rome

Nowadays, Rome combines modern traits with signs of the mightiness of the ancient imperial city. But now you can visit a virtual model of the imperial capital with the world's biggest computer simulation of an ancient city.

"Rome Reborn 1.0" displays nearly the entire city at its peak in A.D. 320, under the Emperor Constantine when it reached a million inhabitants.

The $2 million project was developed in 10 years by Bernard Frischer of the University of Virginia. The simulation will eventually present the way the city evolved from Bronze Age hut settlements to the Sack of Rome in the 5th century and the Gothic Wars.

In April 2008, a theater will be opened near Colosseum where the model will be reproduced for tourists on satellite-guided handsets and 3-D orientation movies.

"It will prepare them for their visit to the Colosseum, the Forum, the imperial palaces on the Palatine, so that they can understand the ruins a lot better. We can take people under the Colosseum and show them how the elevators worked to bring the animals up from underground chambers for the animal hunts they held," said Frischer.

"It's a very fascinating experience, re-created with all the necessary historical and philological care. In other words, it will allow us ... to be in the Roman Forum and understand the context we are in," Walter Veltroni, Rome's mayor, praised the project.
Frischer's based his work on ancient maps and building catalogs detailing "apartment buildings, private houses, inns, storage facilities, bakeries and even brothels," but also on digital images of the vast "Plastico di Roma Antica" model built from plaster of Paris in 1936-74, measuring 52 by 56 feet (16 by 17 meters).

Together with researchers from the Politecnico di Milano and University of Florence, Frischer enables scholars in modeling virtual-reality humans amongst ancient buildings for testing practical details like ventilation, capacity or acoustics.

"For example, in scholarly literature the Colosseum has a great reputation for being a great people mover where people could find their seats very quickly. But estimates of the carrying capacity vary wildly from 35,000 to 78,000," he said.

Experiments on his model dropped the number from 48,000 to 50,000 people.
The model also reveals how Romans, who worshiped the sun and moon, aligned their buildings with the summer solstice.

"This is just the first step in the creation of a virtual time machine, which our children and grandchildren will use to study the history of Rome and many other great cities around the world," said Fischer, an allusion to the fact that the virtual model could be made also for other ancient capitals.